Roberts back in Pittsburgh lineup for Game 2 of Cup final series

If history were a deciding factor in a playoff series, then things would look good for the Pittsburgh Penguins. They are shutting out the Detroit Red Wings in an element that’s proven key to winning the Cup since the National Hockey’s 1967 expansion – the ex-Toronto Maple Leafs factor.

Two Penguins – defenceman Hal Gill and left-winger Gary Roberts – are former Leafs, although Roberts didn’t play in the Game 1 opener and was none too happy about it, getting into a reported shouting match with the Pittsburgh coaching staff over his exclusion. He’ll be back in the lineup Monday for Game 2, however, skating alongside Jarkko Ruutu and Adam Hall. Georges Laraque will be scratched to make room for Roberts. Roberts, 42, is back in the final for the first time since he won the Cup with the Calgary Flames in 1989. “I’ve waited 19 years to get back to the Stanley Cup final,” he said. “But the bottom line is that I am in the lineup and I’m going to do what I can to help the team. I think I can bring some intensity and I can bring some physical play. We’ve got to try to get in on them and hit their defence, although they don’t give you much opportunity to hit them. We didn’t do that in Game 1, but then again, every team has tried to do that and hasn’t had much success at it either.”

Penguins captain Sidney Crosby believes Roberts can give Pittsburgh an element that’s been missing. “He’s going to bring a physical presence,” Crosby said. “When he’s on the ice, everyone knows it.” “I enjoy being around this group of guys,” he said. “I’ve had a trying year with my health, not the year I wanted to have, but I’m excited to be here, excited to be part of the thing and hopefully at some point, I’ll get that chance.”

Gill, the other ex-Leaf, arrived in a trade deadline-day deal and immediately found a niche as a shutdown defender. “Your world gets tossed upside down a little bit, but eventually, everything settles and I feel pretty comfortable in Pittsburgh with this team, so it’s business as usual right now,” Gill said, excited by the challenge of trying to find a way to deter Red Wings stars Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg, who combined for 13 shots on goal in Detroit’s 4-0 Game 1 victory. “Individually, you can’t say, ‘I’m going to go out and stop those two players.’ You’ve got to go out and play hard and count on your teammates to help you out. We’re going to need big saves. We’re going to need guys coming back and backchecking. It’s not really a big task that we’re asking one person to do. We want to contain them obviously, shut them down and it’s going to take a team to do that.”

Gill has found the youth and skill of the Penguins to be revitalizing after the struggling campaign with Toronto. “The whole thing about this team is we have a lot of young guys and our mentality is we’re a young group that has fun and goes out and plays hockey,” Gill said. “You can see it with the speed we have in the neutral zone. Our forwards come back, they play hard. I think we have a lot of fun out there. The young guys, they just go out and have fun. It’s a game to them and they just go out and play it. I’m kind of following their lead and just enjoying it. It doesn’t matter what kind of game it is, they’re willing to play that style, get up for it and have fun with it.”

A complete list of former Leafs who’ve won the Stanley Cup since 1967:

Pittsburgh goalie Marc-Andre Fleury was the brunt of his teammates’ jokes and taking a pratfall while coming out on the ice for the start of Game 1 Saturday. “Me and my buddy were kneeling down and all of a sudden Fleury comes running out,” said Alec Thieda, a Red Wings employee who was sitting nearby. “His pad catches the corner of the boards and he just eats it. I’ve never seen something that funny in my life. I’ve gotten 25 phone calls already. I’ve never been that close to something like that. It’s awesome.” . . . For the first time since he suffered a broken jaw earlier this season, Detroit forward Dan Cleary performed in Game 1 minus his protective faceguard. “I felt really good without the shield on,” Cleary said. “I don’t know how to explain it. It’s like having a pebble in your shoe. You can still run with it but it just doesn’t feel right. I felt really good having it off. The vision was a lot better holding the puck. I was more confident.”

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